The retail merchandising of a broad variety of products involve the use of rack or shelf-based display structures. Very often, the products supported for display, collectively, are relatively heavy. For instance, caulking gun refills, paints, and the like can require customer "reachable" feed forward shelving capable of retaining about 400 pounds worth of merchandise.
In achieving requisite supporting strength, the shelving must be sufficiently "open" to permit the customer to identify varieties of the product, for example, caulking types and paint types, colors and the like. However, requisite strength and openness also must be achieved with a high level of aesthetic quality contributing to a desired ambiance within the retail environment.
Because consumer demands for products generally vary with time and the products displayed by merchants change, merchandising display shelving layouts change periodically. Thus, it is helpful for display component fabricators to have a capability for easily expanding, contracting, or geometrically varying a given display line. Heretofore, typical display shelving for heavier, more robust products have been fabricated of conventional sheet metal configurations connected to uprights. This connection may be carded out, for example, with coupling schemes such as the ubiquitous hook and slot or by bolting. To achieve modularity of sorts, stand alone versions of such shelves are available wherein an "L-shaped" back and foot structure is provided for shelf support. When loaded with goods, resultant forward leaning moment is derived to stabilize the loaded assembly. This form of shelving as well as conventional metal shelving has led to some concern, inasmuch as the customer and children of customers may, from time to time, grasp the forward portion of the display and pull it to tend to tip it over. With conventional steel shelving, however, modularity or fabrication flexibility to meet the changing needs of merchandising with ease has not been effectively realized.
Movable shelving or merchandising racks typically are assembled out of a shipping carton by retail clerks. Such assembly usually involves interconnection of a significant number of components with nuts and bolts in accordance with printed instructions. Very often, such assembly poses an unwanted burden upon the clerks in view of the detail necessarily required of instructions describing bolted assembly. As a consequence, the shelving may not be assembled properly leading to potential hazards at the retail floor.
Sheet metal shelving also exhibits the attributes of weight and bulk. Thus, the costs of its shipment becomes a recognizable component of their overall cost to the retailer. By meeting the bulk and weight criteria of certain shipping entities, substantial reductions in landed delivered cost savings may be provided for the retailer. Tooling also becomes a cost aspect for sheet metal shelving, the tooling costs required for fabrication of sheet components being somewhat elevated.
Retail merchandising entities also employ portable shelf assemblies configured as vertically stacked sequences of spaced-apart shelves. These smaller racks are positioned in aisleways and the like representing regions of higher customer density. It is desirable that such devices be rigid to withstand contact by customers while remaining sufficiently lightweight so as to be readily positioned from place to place throughout a retail store by employees.